DHL continues to enhance its own Thermonet temperature-controlled air freight service with now over 100 network stations and additional IATA CEIV certification

Singapore - DHL has named Lufthansa Cargo & Swiss WorldCargo, United Cargo and Emirates SkyCargo as the recipients of this year's Carrier Award for Reliability and Excellence. Inaugurated in 2016, the DHL CARE Awards acknowledge air freight providers whose services set the industry standard for the transport of temperature-sensitive life sciences products. The DHL CARE Awards were presented at the 17th DHL Global Life Sciences and Healthcare Conference in Singapore this week, where close to 400 life sciences and healthcare leaders met to discuss major supply chain trends affecting the industry.

"Today's consumers demand much faster and more flexible delivery of medications, medical devices and other life sciences products than ever before," said Scott Allison, President, Life Sciences & Healthcare, at DHL. "With the online pharmaceutical market set to grow to US$128 billion by 20231, the pressure is on air cargo carriers to provide temperature-controlled air services with the high levels of speed, shipment quality and real-time visibility needed to cope with the sheer velocity of demand. The DHL CARE Awards act as a yardstick by which DHL can select the carriers most aligned with its customers' increasingly stringent needs for delivering healthcare to the world with shipment integrity, accuracy and compliance."

This year's DHL CARE Award winners were chosen from a pool of carriers according to criteria including shipment quality, ground handling expertise and innovation in both technology and process. The award recipients all demonstrated extremely high levels of shipment performance, combined with a variety of factors including rigorous certification and bold infrastructural investments.

"Since the first DHL CARE Awards hosted last year, we have seen a significant trend amongst carriers towards higher levels of certification, innovative commercial agreements with packaging and data-tracking partners, and bespoke infrastructure for pharmaceutical goods," said David Bang, Global Head, DHL Temperature Management Solutions; and CEO, LifeConEx, DHL Global Forwarding. "In the past 12 months, DHL's own Thermonet temperature-controlled service has expanded to include 100 stations certified by Good Distribution Practices standards, with 30 of those stations also obtaining IATA CEIV Pharma Certification. We have continued to invest in new technologies within the LifeTrack ecosystem, such as Big Data Analytics, IoT, and Risk Intelligence Engine, for proactive monitoring and intervention of time and temperature-sensitive medicinal products. Our work with the world's top air carriers ensures that hospitals, distributors and patients receive products they can trust with their lives, and these awards highlight the logistics industry's continuing efforts to raise the bar in this literally vital industry."